


Does This Version Come With A Rulebook?

by Cosmic_Biscuit



Category: Marvel Adventures: Avengers, Tiger and Bunny
Genre: Crossover, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-17
Updated: 2011-11-17
Packaged: 2017-10-26 04:48:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,183
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/278866
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cosmic_Biscuit/pseuds/Cosmic_Biscuit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>During the ten month time skip, a fight with a strangely-powered NEXT ends with Blue Rose tossed across dimensions into a world both somewhat familiar and very different from anything she's used to. Luckily for her, the Avengers have seen far stranger than her, and are more than willing to help her fit in.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Does This Version Come With A Rulebook?

Blinking fuzzily at the sky above her, Karina dimly wondered when it had started raining. Then turned her head to see that she’d apparently landed on a pile of junk... in the middle of a forest?

Wait.

She recognized that lamppost. The NEXT they’d been fighting had hit it with his attack when Barnaby had dodged out of the way. And that paper stand had been a missed shot at Dragon Kid.  
 _  
‘So... it’s some kind of transportation attack?’_ she thought, then a shadow fell over her.

"Huh. So _you_ were our weird little radar blip."

Karina looked back up towards the sky and found herself staring at a hooded figure. Female, by the voice, but one could never be too sure. She made an attempt to get up, and found herself still feeling unsteady and weirdly drained. _‘Maybe people weren’t meant to go through... whatever portal that guy made.’_

"Hey, can you talk?" the figure over her asked, then repeated the question in a language Karina recognized as Portuguese after a few seconds of getting her thoughts together.

"I- Where am I?" she asked, finally making her tongue work.

"About five miles off the border of Brazil and Costa Verde," the figure she was now sure was a woman replied, hooking her under the arms to help her to her feet. Brazil Karina knew about, but she’d never heard of a place called Costa Verde, and must have said so, because her rescuer chuckled.

"You’re not the first to say that. Or to get dumped here."

"NEXTs have sent people here before?" she asked as she was pulled under a wide-sprawling tree to get out of the rain.

"Dunno what a NEXT is. But we get called to handle weird stuff every week or so, so this is nothing new." The woman pulled back her hood, revealing shoulder-length dark brown hair and amused blue eyes. "Giant-Girl of the Avengers," she said, offering a hand to shake once she’d propped Karina against the tree.

"You don’t look very giant," Karina replied before her brain could catch up to her mouth. Turning red, she put a hand over her mouth in embarrassment, but Giant-Girl only laughed.

"Well, duh. I wouldn’t be able to _fit_ anywhere if I was a giant _all_ the time. I’m a sizeshifter. It used to be totally tech-based, but now I can pretty much do with or without."

"Oh." Karina coughed, regaining her manners, and accepted the offered hand. "Blue Rose, no group affiliation," she said, sure that a sponsor probably wasn’t what the other girl meant. "And, um, I have ice powers."

"Neat!"

Giant-Girl’s smile was oddly infectious, and Karina found herself feeling quite a bit better as her rescuer went to peer out from under their shelter. "Looks like the rain’s gonna let up for a little while. I don’t suppose you brought any other clothes with you?"

"Er, no," Karina said, suddenly feeling uncomfortable at the scrutinizing look the other girl gave her. "Why?"

"Well, the suit can stay, I guess. Even with the rain, your powers should keep you from getting cold, and it’ll warm back up anyway once the rain stops. But we’ve got a ways to hike, and you’re gonna break an ankle in those heels on this terrain."

"Still better than going barefoot," Karina replied, a little more defensively than she’d meant to.

"Good thing I always bring spares, then," Giant-Girl replied cheerily. She pulled something out of her belt, and Karina stared as in a flash of orange light dots, two pairs of boots seemed to just materialize in the other girl’s hands. "Pink or blue?"

Karina stared at the offerings, then looked down at the other girl’s feet. She was wearing a pink pair that matched the gloves and embellishments of her full-body suit. The soles were wedged, thick and treaded, and looked comfortable. For a brief moment, Karina was suddenly envious. _‘Bet_ she _doesn’t have a marketing team to decide what kind of shoes she wears,'_ she thought. Well, the marketing team wasn’t here, and neither were any cameras, and she could damn well wear what she wanted to. "Pink," Karina said decisively, and began to strip off her own boots.

Giant-Girl handed over the pink pair and accepted the ones Karina handed back in return, and they vanished back into her belt along with the blue pair she’d produced. When Karina pulled on her ‘new’ ones, she found they were a little too big. Before she could try to adjust them herself, Giant-Girl crouched down and lightly prodded them, and there was another flash of orange dots before they snugged down to a perfect fit. "How do you do that?"

"A type of matter-altering particle a friend of mine developed. This suit used to be entirely wired to generate and control them in order to allow us to grow or shrink, but since I’ve absorbed enough of the material that it’s more or less bonded to my cells now, I only have to have my clothing treated with them so it changes with me, instead of needing the suit to use the power. The suit can still produce extra though, to change things I touch."

"That’s... really cool, actually," Karina said, impressed by what of the explanation she’d been able to keep up with. "That you can change your clothing like that. I mean, I don’t have to worry about freezing _myself_ or anything, but my suit doesn’t really have that kind of protection, so it can still get all iced over and gross after a fight."

"That sucks. We’ll have to ask Ant-Man to see if he can figure out a way to fix that when we meet up with everybody else."

Karina raised an eyebrow at the name, but allowed Giant-Girl to pull her to her feet, finding that her new boots were just as comfortable as they’d looked. The other girl also offered her a spare rain cloak, and though that at least didn’t bother her, she accepted it as well.

They’d been hiking down the side of the mountain for a few minutes when Karina noticed a small group of what looked like villagers waiting for them on a trail. "What are you doing here, anyway?"

"A friend of ours lives around here. Silverclaw’s the only resident hero in this part of the rainforest, so when she couldn’t get an incoming strip mine operation halted, she asked us to help with the evacuation so no civilians would get caught up in the mess."

"No news cameras or anything?"

"Ugh, no. They’d just get in the way."

 _‘Weird,’_ Karina thought as they met up with the small knot of people and Giant-Girl introduced her in Portuguese as an assisting hero. Two small children immediately latched onto her hands, and Karina’s misgivings were shoved aside in favor of ruffling their hair comfortingly as the group got moving.

"Oh, by the way, my name’s Janet," Giant-Girl said in English as they walked along, and Karina raised an eyebrow.

"You’re okay with me knowing that? We just met," she said, and ‘Janet’ looked faintly embarrassed.

"I accidentally got outed a few months ago, so it’s not really a big deal. I figure since you’re helping and all, it’d be pretty rude to just let you find out from the news reports when we get back to New York."

She didn’t miss the faint emphasis on ‘we’, just as she’d noticed it before. It was... kind of strange, the way the other girl had just sort of assumed that they were automatically friends. Even Nathan and Keith, as open as they were, tended to be a little more reserved than that. Hell, even _Kotetsu_ tended to take at least a few days to warm up to someone. She kind of liked it.

"I’m Karina."

 

It had been nearly two hours when they suddenly felt an ominous rumble under their feet and Giant-Girl looked up the side of the mountain in alarm. "They wouldn’t."

"Wouldn’t what?" Karina asked, and got her answer as there was a sudden explosion above them. The rumble turned into a roar as dirt and rocks and trees suddenly came sliding in their direction, and the last thing she heard was the other girl’s shouted order at the panicking civilians to _"Stay together!"_

 

Karina opened her eyes to darkness. As her vision gradually adjusted, she realized one very important thing.

She wasn’t dead.

She was leaning against something solid and soft. She could hear crying and shuffling around, and in the pinpoints of light through the rocks that surrounded them, she could almost count heads. All of the civilians that had come with them were still up and moving. Injured, but moving. But how-

A weak wheeze above her made her look up, and her breath caught in her throat when she was met with the sight of an impossibly huge body hunched on all fours over the lot of them, supporting the mass of rock that should have crushed them all. Biting her lip, she hesitantly touched the arm that turned out to have been her resting spot. "Giant-Girl?"

"Everybody okay?" The strained responding whisper in Portuguese was still loud enough for everyone to hear, and a dozen voices responded affirmatives, or spoke of the minor wounds they’d received. "Good. Rose?" she asked, switching to English, and Karina sat up straighter. "Up here, please."

Karina hesitated, then carefully climbed up the other woman’s sleeve, trying to balance between shoulder and rock as best as she could.

"What’s the situation look like?" Janet rasped weakly.

"We’ve got some points of daylight, but it could still take hours to dig out, even using my ice," Karina admitted.

"My communicator’s busted. I can feel the pieces."

No chance of outside help either, then. Karina felt muscle and bone shift under her, and knew their time was going to be too short for digging. Swallowing, she dropped her voice even lower, hoping she was close enough to the other woman’s ear for her to hear. "You could still get out."

"The cavern will collapse if I shrink."

"But you’d still get out."

"Not a chance." Hair brushed against her body as the other woman turned her head, and in what little light they had, she could see a pained smile. "Avengers don’t leave people behind. We either all get out or I don’t."

The sheer conviction sent a small spike through her chest, and Karina had to hang on to Janet’s hair to keep from losing her balance. Then there was a crunch from somewhere off to their left, and Janet made a low groan that sent a wave of fear through the people below them. Karina squeezed her eyes shut. She’d been serious a moment ago, about maybe just a few of them, or even one escaping, but knowing that her temporary partner would face suffering this instead of saving herself...

Okay.

Think.

"What about growing, then? Could you break through?"

"Too unstable," Janet replied. "Any shifting could bring the rest of it down. But... maybe with some ice reinforcement..."

"I’ll do it. Anything you need."

"Okay, then. I’m gonna need it first around my left leg."

"Why?"

"Break below the knee. I can feel it any time I move at all. If I try to stand to brace the rock, it’s not gonna hold me."

Karina nervously tightened her hands, accidentally pulling at the hair she was holding on to. "Are you sure you want to-"

"My suit will protect me from the cold. I just need you to make sure to reconstruct it each time it cracks when I grow, or we’re all going down."

Oh God. She wasn’t so sure about her idea now. But Karina slid down to land on her feet and directed all their charges over to the far side of the cavern, where they’d be least likely to be hit by any rocks dislodged in the moving effort. "Ready?" she asked, hoping she sounded more confident than she felt.

"Ready."

Struggling to keep from losing her balance or her hold on the rock above her, Janet carefully moved her leg from its previous position in order to put a foot on the ground. Bone visibly shifted as she did so, and Karina had to fight back the reflexive urge to throw up at the sight of that and the look of anguish on her partner’s face as Janet tried to keep from making any noise. Mentally crossing her fingers, Karina quickly encased the limb in a sheen of ice, then added another brace to the space where Janet’s leg had previously been.

"Here we go," Janet muttered, then slowly began to grow.

Rocks rattled loose and civilians scattered to avoid them as she arranged herself to support as much of their cover as possible before starting to lift. Pinpoints became holes, became a single gap, and Karina worked quickly, trying to keep the 'roof' and Janet’s leg braced as smoothly as possible to prevent any more rocks potentially injuring their charges or themselves. As soon as the gap was wide enough, children and anyone else who would fit began scrambling through, and neither girl bothered to try and tell them to stay put. The faster everyone got out, the better.

There was a final sharp crack as the last person fled the hole, and as Janet collapsed with a moan of pain, Karina belatedly realized that in the process of keeping the ice around the barricade from melting, she’d forgotten that the leg brace could still melt as well, even when Janet had stopped growing. Swearing and gasping apologies, she quickly gave the roof one last bracing cover and ran over as the other girl shrank back down to normal size.

"Everybody out?" Janet asked weakly, cutting into her rambling.

"Yeah. We’re the last ones left. God, I am _so sor_ -"

"Don’t worry about it. It’s cool. It’s awesome, y’know? Everything’s awesome. I’m gonna pass out now, okay?" Before Karina could say anything further, Janet’s eyes rolled back and she went limp.

Karina took a deep breath, hands clenching and unclenching at her sides, then she remembered what limited medic training she’d been given and quickly crouched down to make check the other girl over. Only the leg felt broken, though there was no telling what kinds of internal injuries might have been sustained. She could feel a lump on the back of Janet’s head, and the rocks had shredded her rain cloak, though there were only a few small bloody scratches through the bodysuit underneath it. She found the pieces of what had probably been the communicator Janet had mentioned, and it was well and truly useless. Janet was surprisingly light, and without the fear of having to walk in heels, Karina could probably carry her...

...If she had any idea where they were going. That was a sudden terrifying thought. Janet had mentioned something about a research station, but with the civilians having all fled, Karina had no idea where to look for it.

"Who are you?"

Karina jumped at the sound of a whispery new voice, then completely froze when she turned her head to find herself nose-to-nose with a _massive_ silver-scaled snake of some kind. "Ah- I-"

With an altering of mass and bone and limbs - _‘Oh, God, that is so much creepier than how Ivan does it’_ \- the snake became a dark-haired girl in some kind of loincloth outfit and headdress, still with silver-colored skin. What had Janet said the local hero was named? "S- Silverclaw?" Karina tried hesitantly.

"Yes. Who are you?" the new girl repeated curtly.

"Blue Rose," Karina said, managing to keep her voice even. "Um, I was sent here by accident and Giant-Girl found me. I was helping with-"

"I crossed paths with your group on the way here. What caused the rockslide?"

"There was an explosion," Karina replied, and Silverclaw’s scowl darkened further as she looked up the hill.

"The company promised to not start blasting until tomorrow," she said and Karina fought down a shiver at the obvious implication. Then Silverclaw looked down at Janet, and her expression finally softened. "Are her ribs broken? How about her spine?" she asked, and when Karina shook her head at both, the other girl suddenly warped into a huge silver tiger. "Then I will carry her. You come too."

Those teeth were a hell of a lot scarier than Janet’s growing had been, and Silverclaw wasn’t nearly as friendly. But considering the alternative was to sit and wait in the rainforest until help came from her world -if it ever did- Karina quickly got up to help drape Janet over the big cat’s back.

 

They had just gotten in sight of a grey, stark-looking building when a swirl of wind swept around them. For a brief moment, Karina hoped to see Sky High, but when she looked up, the wind apparently belonged to a dark-skinned woman with white hair and black clothing flying above them. " _There_ you are," she said, sounding relieved and worried all at once. "Is Giant-Girl all right?"

"The miners have already started blasting," the tiger beside Karina replied... somehow. "The civilians are safe, but Giant-Girl has been wounded. And this one calls herself Blue Rose."  
Karina managed to stop herself from bristling at the cat’s tone and stood straight as the white-haired woman landed while messing with something on the earpiece she wore.

"I’ve alerted medics to the current status, if you will both follow me," she said, demeanor pleasant despite her obvious concern. Silverclaw trotted after her, and Karina brought up the rear. As promised, people in green uniforms were waiting with a gurney when they entered the small compound, and Janet was whisked away for treatment. "Do you need to see a doctor as well?" the woman asked, and Karina mumbled that she was fine just before her stomach made a faint growl. That seemed to amuse both of her companions at least, and the woman guided them to what looked like a small cafeteria.

Too hungry to really care about what she picked, Karina ended up with some rice, some kind of chicken dish, and some juice. The tiger had become a girl again when she sat down at a table at the other two, and the white-haired woman was nursing a cup of coffee. "If you don’t mind my asking, why are you wearing a pair of Giant-Girl’s boots?"

After so many interviews, Karina knew a leading question when she heard one, but still felt more obligated to explain to this woman than she had to Silverclaw. With some hesitance at first, she told about the fight that had gotten her sent here in the first place, how Janet had been nice enough to loan her the boots and rain cloak, and what had happened after their group had been trapped. The woman had only nodded understandingly at her admission of having been tossed in from another world and hadn't really questioned her about the sponsor patches on her gloves - _'Maybe it's not just Janet. Maybe things really are that strange here,'_ she thought- and then smiled approvingly when she'd finished.

"Using your powers in tandem like that was a very good idea," she said, and out of the corner of her eye, Karina noticed Silverclaw nod, looking considerably less hostile.

"Well, um, it was mostly hers," Karina admitted sheepishly.

"Still, it was impressive," the woman said, then offered a hand. "I am Storm. Or, if you prefer when we're not in public, Ororo."

"You can control wind, can't you?"

"Weather in general, actually. Rain, snow, wind, lightning. The works, as the others would say."

Like before with Janet, Karina couldn't help smiling at the woman's dry humor, and found it a little easier to continue her meal after that. She was just swallowing the last of her juice when she got a prickly feeling of being watched, and happened to look up. Then squeaked in surprise to find a red-masked face staring back from about a foot above her.

"Boo," it said cheerily, earning a faint chuckle from Silverclaw, and she realized it was attached to a guy hanging upside down from the ceiling by some kind of cord. He dropped down beside her with an acrobatic flip, and indicated the last piece of chicken kabob she hadn't finished. "You gonna eat that?"

"The kitchen's still open," Ororo said, saving her from potentially embarrassing herself with an automatic rude reply to the childish inquiry.

"Sweet," the stranger said, grin evident even behind the mask, and neatly hopped up to go get himself some food.

"That would be Spider-Man," Ororo explained in response to Karina's questioning look. "He'll probably wait until we get home to give you his real name."

Karina watched the guy snag a bread roll with some kind of webbing before climbing up the wall to settle himself comfortably and munch on his gains. "Are all hero names here so _literal_?" she asked without really meaning to, and blushed when both of the other women at the table laughed.

"It's mostly a matter of convenience," Ororo said. "We sometimes work with police and military, and SHIELD, of course, so having names that are easily usable makes for better communication. There are some who still have more symbolic names, but they are usually given them, rather than choose them."

"Like me," Karina murmured. "My bosses picked mine," she clarified in response to Ororo's raised eyebrow, and the woman nodded.

"You might talk to Cap about that. He knows what it's like to be used as a propaganda figure," she said, but 'Spider-Man' waved her over to talk about the food they'd gotten before Karina could ask her for more detail, or who 'Cap' was.

 

By the time night had fallen, everyone had been accounted for, and Karina had been introduced to six other heroes currently bustling about assisting refugees. She had just finished helping Firebird and a big guy named Luke Cage -"Seemed stupid to keep calling myself Power Man when all the dudes I fought were calling me by name anyway," he'd said with a shrug when she'd asked- hand out sleeping bags to all the civilians when one of the medics informed them all that Janet had woken up.

Karina felt awkward being the first one in. After all, she'd only known the other girl hours compared to the months, minimum, of everyone else. But Spider-Man had shoved her out of the cafeteria with a grin and a slightly ominous announcement that they could hassle Giant-Girl later, so Karina found herself poking her head into the infirmary, then approaching when Janet waved her in.

"So, what's the verdict?"

"Mild concussion, two breaks to the fibula, and one in the tibia." She grinned. "Not bad for having half a mountain dropped on me, yeah?"

Karina couldn't help an amused snort, moving to take a seat beside the bed.

"Have you met everybody else, yet?"

"Yeah, all the groups are in for the night. Is it normal for so many scientists to be running around in costume?" Karina asked, remembering the reactions to her story of how she'd gotten here in the first place.

"Heh, you haven't even seen the half of it yet. I could name seven more people with doctorates and costumes without even thinking. It's just kind of a... thing. Doctors with powers want to use them to help people, scientists with powers see big opportunities for field testing."

"That makes sense... sort of. The guy in the armor -Iron Man, I think? Anyway, he said that they could get a think tank together to find a way to send me home, but depending on the research and any emergencies that pop up, it could take awhile."

"Any decisions made on where you're gonna stay until then?"

"Well, they said there are rooms available in the team base at Stark Tower, wherever that is, but I don't really want to... y'know, take up space. I can just find a hotel or somethi-"

"Oh, no, you don't. If you don't want to stay at the tower, you can stay with me and Greer."

"Who?"

"Tigra. She's a teammate and buddy of ours," Janet said, and Karina remembered Scarlet Witch and Cage mentioning something about a 'Tigra' and a 'Mockingbird' almost being done with a sneak mission.

"But I'll still be taking up space."

"No, you won't. I rent a whole floor of lofts to keep the press off our cases. Greer and I share one, so that leaves three more for anybody who needs a place to crash for awhile. You're more than welcome to one."

"I... well..." It was awkward, just being straight-up asked to _live with someone_ , in a way, especially since she hadn't even had a full day here, yet. But she had to admit that a hotel was one of her less practical ideas. The currency here probably wasn't even the same, and it wasn't like she had access to her bank account anyway. And having a loft to herself would be a little less of a change than suddenly sharing living space with a bunch of people... "Okay."

"Great! Then when we get back to New York, we'll get you all stocked up on food and clothes, and you can meet some more heroes."

Karina blinked. "How many of you _are_ there?"

"Oh, tons. We have an international network through SHIELD, so we can work together on lots of different threats. Heck, the Avengers alone have a reserve of over fifty heroes across the country."

"I'm not going to be meeting them _all_ , am I?" Karina asked, a little intimidated by the numbers.

"Oh, no. We've all got stuff to do outside of the heroing gig, so it's not like we're all just constantly hanging around headquarters waiting for calls. Though it is kinda fun to hang around headquarters sometimes. You'll see."

Something about the way Janet said that made Karina slightly dread it.

 

They had seen the refugees, along with Firebird and Silverclaw, off to the center that was going to help the civilians rebuild in a safer location before boarding a sleek-looking jet of some kind. "This is yours?" Karina asked.

"Well, _his_ , really," Janet said as she fidgeted with the walking cast she'd been given, then pointed to the suit of armor in the pilot's seat. "He built it, we just use it."

"Built it. Like, by _himself_."

"Yeah, because he's so anal about the specs that if he'd hired people to build it for him, he'd've been going behind them reconstructing everything anyway," Spider-Man said as he stretched out in a chair.

"You could always find your own way home, bug," Iron Man said without bothering to look up from his flight checklist, and the spider shut up with a small squeak.

Karina hid a smile, then leaned over to see Storm busily typing away on a laptop. "What's that?"

"Janet's family and Tony have been kind enough to allot quite a bit of funding for the rebuilding project. I am merely finishing up the materials orders so that Firebird will have a little less paperwork to do when she and the others reach the center."

She glanced at the armored hero again, then at Janet, who'd finally gotten the adjustable part of her cast the way she wanted it. "Oh." Unable to explain the weird feeling in her chest, she settled deeper into her seat and turned her head to watch out the window as they lifted off.

 

In some ways, New York turned out to be a lot like Sternbild, like when they flew over Times Square. In others, it was completely different. Like how the island was an actual _landmass_ instead of sitting on pillars, or how the island was only _part_ of the city. And there were so many more old buildings mixed in with the new, she noticed as they disembarked on the roof of the building Janet lived in.

"So, what do you think so far?" Janet asked over the noise of the jet's takeoff as she unlocked the maintenance door to go down.

"It's interesting. I'm used to seeing buildings being a lot more uniform."

"Eh, all the areas have their own look. You'll start picking up on the trends after a couple of days."

The first loft unlocked was apparently the one Janet and 'Greer' lived in, judging by the pile of papers on the coffee table and the bits of fabric scattered about. "Make yourself at home. I'll get us something to drink."

Karina found herself a seat that didn't have too much mess, and as she sank into it, she noticed a drawing on the floor. A lot of them, actually. Curious, she picked one up to find a page full of plant-themed outfits. "Pretty. Whose are these?"

"Eh?" Janet leaned out of the kitchen. "Oh, those are mine. I'm in my second year of a design major."

"And heroing?" Sure, she was doubling up now, but she honestly hadn't given much thought to continuing it when she reached college. Thinking about it, honestly, she didn't know how Nathan managed essentially having two jobs.

"Oh, yeah. Most of us are like that." Janet handed her a glass of lemonade, then sank onto the couch with a sigh. "You've already met some of the scientists, Ms. Marvel and War Machine are both military, Iron Man's got his company, Storm and Wolverine are both teachers at a school for superpowered kids, She-Hulk's a lawyer, Spidey's still in high school, Living Lightning and I are both in college... Heck, Black Panther's got it the worst. Dude's gotta run a whole country when he's not heroing."

"Geez," Karina muttered, staring into her glass. When she looked up again, Janet had produced a laptop from somewhere and was working on something. Karina craned her neck to look and saw what looked like a lot of measurements. "What are you working on?"

"Just doing some quick seam eyeballing so we can cut down on shopping time. I can arrange for grocery deliveries, but I'd rather get your clothing in person so we can figure out what will need tailoring and what won't."

"You don't have to go to any trouble-"

"Pff, no trouble. Even with our medical tricks, _this_ -" Janet lifted up her foot for emphasis, "-will have me stuck on the reserve list for a couple of weeks at least, and I've got no intention of just sitting around on my butt being _bored_ during spring break."

Karina found herself blushing at the offer, then stiffened in surprise. Even after Storm's explanation, she'd only expected a "Tigra" to possibly have a more tiger-themed costume than what her Tiger wore, not the orange-furred face that popped over the back of the couch just before the newcomer neatly vaulted over it to land in a crouch on the armrest Janet was leaning back against.

"Geez, Ladybug. I'm gone for two weeks and you go and get yourself messed up." The striped woman ignored the snort Janet made in response, sharp, slit-pupiled blue eyes flicking in Karina's direction as a tail - _tail_ \- swished. "This the new girl Witchy told me about?"

"Yep," Janet said, not bothering to look up from her work. "Greer, this is Karina Lyle, or Blue Rose, Karina, this is Greer Nelson-"

"Tigra," Karina managed to make herself say, and was ridiculously proud of herself for not squeaking when Greer grinned at her, _very_ sharp teeth flashing.

"I don't bite or shed," she said cheekily. "Or shed _much_ , anyway." She leaned over the other girl, red hair falling over the keys of Janet's laptop. "Ladybug, you busy?"

"That depends."

"Too busy for a headscratching?"

Looking faintly amused, Jan set the laptop down on a clear space on the coffee table, and Greer made a tiny noise of glee before -apparently oblivious to Karina's now wide-eyed stare- flopping down in Janet's lap and wriggling until they were stretched out and settled with Greer's head now resting on Janet's stomach. "I swear to God, sometimes it's hard to believe you're older than me," Janet said as she began running her fingers through red hair, occasionally scratching at her companion's scalp or neck.

"Oh, shut up. It's only by a year anyway," Greer replied, and Karina would swear that she could hear her actually beginning to _purr_ under the attention.

"Are you two...?"

"Are we what?"

"Uh, nevermind."

 

The shopping trip proved to be quite informative as well as exhausting. For instance, after her fourth failed attempt, Karina learned that protesting being given things wasn't going to get her anywhere. If anything, it only made Janet _more_ insistent on finding things for her, and the argument during round three had left Greer laughing at her for a solid minute before she could get herself under control.

"Is she _always_ like this?" Karina asked Greer as their companion sorted through a rack of pants.

"Pretty much. Ladybug just likes doing stuff for people. Heck, the whole reason we live together is because she let me move in after my landlord kicked me out."

"Kicked you out? Why?"

"Got stuck in this form permanently." Karina must have had a questioning look on her face, because the other girl continued. "See this little skull thingy on my belt? It's a magic talisman that got attached to me. It used to let me change back and forth between having fur and being totally human at will. Then it up and quit. Turns out the shape I am now is a locked mode. Being able to change before was just prepping me for it."

"That's... wow. I'm not sure if that's cool or really sucks."

"Eh, little of both," Greer said, shrugging. "I like having the powers, and I've adjusted to the quirks, and most people are really chill about it, but my landlord was a jerk. Said it counted as having a pet in my apartment, which was against building codes."

"What an _ass_ ," Karina said without thinking, then coughed in embarrassment at swearing.

"He really was," Greer agreed, not seeming to mind. "But now I'm living in a much better place anyway, and Ladybug didn't even up my rent or anything. She'd probably let me go without paying at _all_ if I asked, but I won't."

"How come you get away with refusing things and I can't?" Karina asked, a little petulance creeping into her voice. "I'm just... not _used_ to having someone throw things at me like this."

"It'll be okay. With Ladybug, you just gotta pick your battles. Once she figures out your boundaries, she'll quit pushing too hard on the really sensitive ones."

"Fair enough, I guess."

As they continued perusing stores, only occasionally forced into breaks by Janet's injuries or the need for food, Karina noticed that Greer's assessment of people's reaction to her was true. There were a few stares, a few mutters, but for the most part, people seemed to actually enjoy having someone who looked like her around, asking for pictures and autographs from her and Janet both. It was strange, seeing someone so visibly powered being so accepted compared to the reactions to NEXTs back home. "What's the situation like for people with powers here?" she asked as they were resting at an outdoor cafe.

"Eh, it depends, really," Janet said after swallowing a sip of milkshake.

"Yeah. There are always gonna be jerks around saying we shouldn't exist at all, or that we should be locked up and made to work for the government," Greer agreed. "Those born with their powers, like Ororo and Wanda, tend to get it the worst. However, those jerk types are a really small and stupid minority here."

"Most of the time, people are just glad there's somebody who can stop things like alien invasions and time traveling despots."

Karina blinked at them both. " _Alien invasions_?" she asked after a moment of completely failing to process that oh, yes, they weren't just leading her on.

"Oh, you don't have those back home?" Janet asked, and Karina shook her head vehemently. "Man, are _you_ in for some fun. Hey, Greer, remember the Skrull fight in Oxford?"

"Heh, the one where we found out that all those conspiracy theories about the Beatles being shapeshifting aliens were _true_?"

"Yeah, and then Wisdom's all 'You didn't know that? Lennon's been with MI-13 for years' and I swear, Bobbi was about to _hit_ him-"

 

Karina had collapsed into her -abnormally huge, soft- bed, exhausted despite the others having helped put everything except what Janet was keeping to adjust the fit on away. Rolling onto her back, she stared up at the starry pattern that had been painted on the ceiling.

She missed home.

She wondered if the others were okay. If they knew _she_ was okay. If they thought she was _dead._..

Shaking off the suddenly morbid turn of thoughts, Karina closed her eyes. She'd agreed to go to Stark Tower with the others for breakfast and to do a training assessment, and there was no sense in showing up half-asleep.

 

Whatever she'd been expecting when she'd arrived in the massive kitchen the living quarters at the tower held, being audience to a rather disturbing conversation on superhero genetics between Spider-Man and an android who'd been introduced to her as Vision wasn't it. The spider in question -Peter, she assumed, considering that was what he'd been called by the people trying to calm down his freak out- was currently under one of the kitchen counters.

"But would having been bitten not be counted as being sired? It’s so for vampires."

"Just let it go, Vizh," Tony said, draining the last of his coffee as he eyed the fetal ball on the floor. "I think you broke him enough as it is."

"That was not my intent."

A shaking hand reached up and closed around the bottle of drain cleaner still sitting by the sink from where Jarvis had used it earlier, and Greer raised an eyebrow. "You got plans for that?"

"Yes," Peter said decisively. "I’m going to _pour it down my ear canal_ in the hopes of _forgetting this conversation ever happened_."

Janet leaned over the counter and swiped the bottle before he could make good on his threat, and Luke casually picked him up under one arm like he weighed nothing. "C’mon, we’ll go kill stuff in Halo for a few hours and you’ll feel better."

"I’m not a hybrid," Peter mumbled pitifully for the fourth time.

"We know," Janet said, patting him on the head as they passed.

Karina just watched in mild disbelief as the two disappeared from the kitchen. "Is _all_ morning conversation around here like this?"

"Nah, sometimes it gets weird. If you're done with your toast, we should probably head down to the training rooms."

 

"Not bad at all, Miss Lyle," Cap was saying, and Karina was too busy trying to catch her breath to even blush at the approving smile he gave her. "Especially for someone who's never been on one of the courses before."

" _'One_ of'-?" she finally managed to wheeze. Oh, God, she was going to _die_ if they wanted her to do another obstacle course.

"We have seven different presets, plus the courses are all capable of being altered," he said, indicating a nearby computer. "One's enough for today, though."

 _'Yes. Thank you.'_ she thought, relieved, but couldn't manage to get the words out. He gently guided her over to a chair and helped her sit, and she bit back a whimper when her back protested the movement. On one hand, if these people really were fighting off aliens and the like, she could understand the thoroughness of their training exercises, but on the other, it was really embarrassing to experience firsthand just _how_ out of her league she was here.

A bottle of water appeared in her line of vision, and she accepted it gratefully, taking a heavy swig to help get her voice back. "So what happens now?"

"Well, I would recommend regular practice, but your performance now is at least good enough to earn you that field spot you'd asked about," he said, crouching down in front of her so she didn't have to look up. "And the experience on a team would give you a wider range of scenarios to work on."

"So I pass? For now, at least?"

"For now," he agreed, and she couldn't help smiling as she hefted herself up to go tell Janet.

 

Karina quickly learned the hard way that one, none of the people who'd told her this place was weird had been bluffing, and two, no amount of training or forewarning was sufficient for what she was looking at right now. "What the hell is that?" she squealed as a huge, apparently sentient glob of _something_ advanced on her. " _What the hell is that?!_ "

A burst of energy from over her left shoulder fried the thing, only for it to reconstruct itself and go after its new target, Ms. Marvel. "It's a construct created by a mad scientist named Zola," she said, hitting it with more bolts to lead it away from the bomb it had been attempting to reach. "They're a real pain because only certain types of energy make them unstable enough to die, and without Giant-Girl or Ant-Man, we don't have it."

"So how do we _fight_ them?" Karina called, dodging another one as it dropped off the ceiling and lunged at her.

"Freeze _everything_!" the older woman yelled back from up high. "It might hold them long enough to get Ant-Man here!"

"What about the bombs?"

"They can take it."

Okay, she could manage this. Environmental freezing was one of the easiest tricks in the book. The only question was whether she could do it fast enough to snare those... _things,_ considering they moved a _lot_ more quickly than she would have expected.

She narrowly managed to keep from getting hit in the face by a thrown blob, and inwardly shook herself _'Quit questioning! Get to work before you embarrass yourself again!'_ Concentrating her focus on any and all moisture in the atmosphere, including that in the constructs, she let her power surge out of her body, ice coating the floor where she stood and then expanding out to cover the rest of the room. When she was sure the temperature had dropped enough for the whole room, she hesitantly cracked an eye open and squeaked when she saw one of the constructs frozen solid mere inches from her face. Thankfully, it didn't seem like it'd be moving any time soon.

"Nice work," Marvel said, dropping down to land beside her, and the congratulatory clap on the back nearly sent her face first onto the floor. "Next time, though, try to keep your eyes open. If you'd been even a _second_ slower, it would have tried to eat you before you'd even known it was there."

"Can they... really _do_ that?"

"Eh, not in the normal sense of eating. Usually you can just make them burst from the inside. Really disgusting, though," Marvel said, face twisting in distaste, and Karina had to muffle a laugh at what was clearly the voice of personal experience.

Still, Marvel had a point, and Karina quietly resolved to take another swing at the obstacle course. Maybe one of the programmable elements was enemies... Then she felt her costume shift in an uncomfortably familiar way when she moved, and made a face of her own.

Okay, first thing was to see about that protective altering Janet had mentioned.

 

 _"It's essentially a responsive polymer Dr. McCoy and I designed a few years ago. Between all the assorted superhero teams, there are enough element users that finding a way to keep them from accidentally destroying their own costumes and other clothing was vital,"_ Dr. Pym had explained as he'd handed over a small canister from one of the many locked cabinets around his laboratory. A canister that a swarm of _ants_ had carried over. Karina was a little proud of herself for not freaking out. _"It's easy enough to apply. Just mix half the can with two gallons of water and let the costume soak for about eight hours so it will fully bond with the fibers. Then you're good to go."_

As Karina waited for the elevator to go up to her loft, she regarded the container in her hands. If she only needed _half_ for her current costume, then _maybe_...

She thought about her costume again, then about the ones the others wore, both here and back home. Then smiled again at the thought that she didn't have to answer to Suntory here.

Holding the canister a little tighter as she entered the elevator, Karina decided to take Janet up on one of her other offers-

 

-and congratulated herself for doing so when she discovered the new suit could take a hell of a lot more punishment with a lot less wardrobe malfunction worry than her old one. Skidding to a halt after she'd just finished plastering down a small horde of Doombots, she couldn't help letting out a little whoop when her new boots didn't so much as teeter.

"Great job, kid!" Wolverine called from his own pile of destroyed robots, and Karina gleefully tossed him a thumbs up before dashing back into the fray-

 

-only to barely avoid the explosive arrow that almost singed her hair off. "You're quick, and those focus guns are a good idea, but you're relying too much on big attacks," Hawkeye said as she regained her balance. "When you've got one central power, you gotta make it as versatile as possible. You've got an advantage on me in that, because you can do a lot with ice that I can't match in the middle of a fight. But you gotta have the right training to do so." With a neat flick of the wrist, he sent several icicles broken off of her slide zinging into one of the practice robots, throwing-knife-style. "Like so."

Swallowing, Karina nodded, already thinking of things to practice. The knives were a good idea to start with. If she could master _that_ trick, perps with guns back home would be a _lot_ less scary. She mentally scheduled herself another training session after dinner-

Oh, hell, dinner. Swearing under her breath, she quickly scooted to go change and meet the other girls.

 

Gradually, Karina found herself getting used to the "weirdness" of her temporary home. Her new teammates were just kind of a touchy lot, it seemed, even the ones who weren't actually in _relationships_. Eventually it had moved from just being awkward to being strangely comforting. She'd actually felt rather touched the first time Greer had asked her for a headscratch, or when the others had invited her along to the celebratory party after a successful mission with MI-13, even though she hadn't been in the actual fight that night because of a recon necessity.

"Blue's a very good choice for a superhero," Nightcrawler complimented airily from her left, with such an exaggurated preen of his fur that he had to be kidding. "Unlike any other color, it has the potential to work for anyone."

"But what about black? It's supposed to be a classic, isn't it?" Karina asked, amused.

"Overrated. Take Wisdom for example. You'd think that the standard Government Agent look would be _impossible_ to ruin, yet here he is, looking like a disheveled stray cat as always."

Karina didn't recognize the hand gesture the Wisdom in question shot his teammate in response, but judging by the raucous laughter it inspired, it had to be obscene. "Something on your mind?" Excalibur asked from her other side.

"Is Wisdom his codename, or-?"

The older woman laughed. "Oh, no, that's his real name. Our superiors may be daft on occasion, but _no one's_ delusional enough to just _give_ him that one."

"Tossers, every last one of you," Wisdom muttered into his drink, but Karina caught a faint smile on his face as she turned away to answer a question from Ororo-

 

-Before the other hero and Ant-Man tried again to shake Giant-Girl out of her apparent catatonic state. Off to the left, Tigra and Spider-Man were muttering quietly, and Karina had to lean in to figure out that they were actually trying to rate this 'Loki' person on a scale of Weirdest Supervillain to Get Kissed By, and Spider-Man made a confusing comment about how Loki might have "just been mad that he got Bugs Bunnied by a mortal girl."

"He's not _the_ Loki, is he?" Karina quietly asked Cap, hoping for some reassurance. There were a lot more magical things than she'd ever expected to see in her lifetime in this world, but still... And it wasn't exactly helpful when he nodded an affirmative.

"We've tangled with him several times before. Can't say he's ever used this particular tactic though-" he was saying when Giant-Girl suddenly came back to life with an outraged shriek and a bright red blush.

"That _jerk_! I swear, the next time he shows up, I'm gonna _hit him until candy comes out_!"

Cap snorted quietly and glanced over at Thor -who was probably the _actual_ Thor if that had been the _actual_ Loki, and damn, _that_ was a strange thing to acknowledge- as the big man approached. "What do you think?"

"I would advise keeping an eye on her for a few days at least. While it might possibly have been a mere distraction to avoid capture, I won't pretend to know how my brother's mind works. There may have been darker trickery in this." Then a slow grin crossed his face. "I have to say, though, I approve of her choice in coping strategies."

As Karina looked back and forth between the two of them and the others trying to calm Janet down, she wondered if maybe she wasn't _quite_ so used to the weirdness of this world as she'd thought.

 

When Janet's eyes had suddenly started to glow blue that morning, it was decided that some exams might be necessary. Even though the situation was potentially serious, Karina couldn't help laughing at her friend's petulant expression as she boredly drummed her nails on the glass of the tube she was encased in.

"Are we _done_ yet?"

"One more test to go," A man calling himself Strange said as he wove another net of red and gold fire around the tube. Karina had been informed that, like Cage and Wisdom, Strange was his actual name, and she hoped she'd be forgiven for the snort of disbelief she'd made at the time.

As she waited for the tests to finish, an odd object caught her eye, and she went to go investigate. It looked like some kind of metal doorway, but sitting nowhere near a wall, it was just kind of... _there_. And even though it seemed whole, it felt... _incomplete_ , somehow. "What's this?" she asked when T'challa approached.

"Well, once we solve the spatial problem, that will be your route home."

"Spatial problem?" she asked, trying to ignore the fluttery, nervous feeling in her stomach that came at the mention of a possible way home.

He nodded and motioned Pym over. "Do you have our diagram for this project?"

"Sure, hold on a second." He produced a small device from his pocket and switched it on, and a massive flood of formulae and images poured out, rearranging itself into what she assumed would be a readable design for them. It didn't make much sense to her, though. Using a little pen tool, Pym separated out what looked like some kind of glittering, oddly shaped galaxy.

"What's that?" Karina asked, leaning in for a closer look.

"This is our current known map of dimensional realms," T'challa replied, producing a pen tool of his own to circle one of the tiny 'stars'. "Here is the universe where we are located."

"And here's the one you came from," Pym said, circling another.

"Oh. Geez. That's... a really big distance."

"The issue is not so much the distance as it is the location," T'challa said, drawing a line from one to another. "As you can see, there are several realms in the way, so to speak. Normally, we could use a relay method, letting you pass through one to get to another, drawing on each one's power for each trip. But they, like your home realm, are not nearly so malleable as ours."

"You mean no magic and gods and stuff."

"Precisely."

"A colleague of ours is working on a sort of slingshot tool that would allow you to just bypass them. As far as space-time terms go, you would be going around them, but it as far as your sensory perception would go, it'd be a direct trip."

Karina chewed on her lip, trying to follow all of that. "Like... a subway," she finally said, and was gratified when both smiled.

"That's a very good way of putting it."

"Why didn't I have so much trouble _getting here_ , though?"

"Well, in the shortest explanation possible, and one I really hate using, it was a fluke. From what you described of your experience, and the fact that none of the items we've recovered with the same energy signature have ever been called _back_ , it's likely that the one who sent you here had no idea what his power actually _was_."

Karina thought back to the dense-as-a-brick posturing and that godawful "Vaporizer" costume. "Yeah... no. He really didn't."

"It would be an interesting study. Unfortunately, we won't have time for it. If Reed's calculations are correct, we should be ready to open the gate for you next week."

She stared. "Next week?"

"Is that too late?"

"Wha- _no. No!_ It's fine! I- I was actually expecting you to say next _month_ or something. I - Wow."

A week.

She was going home in a _week_. As she stumbled back over to where Strange was letting Janet out of the tube, she felt a little dizzy. She was going to see Sternbild again next week. Her coworkers. Her friends. Her parents. She was going to see them all again _next week_.

Janet waved a hand in front of her face to snap her out of her daze, and she just grinned and hugged the older girl fiercely.

 

It was only when she was back in her loft, after all the cheering and congratulations, that she felt a little melancholy creep into her elation. She really was going to miss this place, and her new friends.

She still had a week, though. Maybe she could make the most of it.

 

She hadn't expected that to include catching petting zoo animals. An attack by Molten Man and his band had caused them to panic and break their enclosures, and getting them to come back proved to be enough of a challenge that some capes had agreed to assist animal control and the keepers. She and Spider-Man were attempting to guide a particularly stubborn alpaca back into her pen when a shadow fell over them.

Turning around, Karina stopped and stared at the green man nearly six times her size. "Ah-"

"Oh, hey, Hulk," Spider-Man casually said before she could potentially ruin the situation with panic. " 'Sup?"

"Back from Savage Land," came the deep rumble. "Hulk helping with animals."

Karina blinked, then finally realized that he had an entire hutch of tiny bunnies tucked under his arm, and a lead in his hand. He shifted to better support the hutch, and she couldn't help noticing how _carefully_ he did it to keep from scaring all the animals inside.

"Alpaca not like legs being touched. Lead gently, not push."

She blinked again before registering that he was talking to her. "Er- thank you."

He nodded and turned to go, and the other end of the lead turned out to contain a little orange, blonde-maned pony who didn't seem to have the slightest problem being guided by a huge mass of earth-cracking muscle.

"Wow."

"That's Hulk for you. He's really mellowed out now that his two personalities aren't fighting anymore."

"Two personalities?" she asked, gently tugging on the alpaca's bridle, and to her surprise, it obediently followed with a small clicking noise.

"Yeah. Remember Doc Pym talking about someone named Bruce Banner?"

It took a few seconds of thinking, then she did remember. "He's some kind of radiation expert, isn't he?" she asked, and Spider-Man nodded.

"That's him. They used to be totally split personalities, and Hulk was always mad at the world and breaking stuff, but they've gotten better."

As the alpaca went to rejoin her little herd and they closed the gate, she looked back in the direction that the green man had gone. "Wow," she murmured again. Now she was almost regretful that she'd been so afraid of meeting all the heroes. There were still so many interesting ones to be introduced to, and she just didn't have the _time_. Before she could be too sad about it, her communicator beeped.

"Oops, almost late for training."

 

Karina picked herself up off the floor where she'd been tossed, glaring sulkily at the smile on Ororo's face. "Why do I even need to know all this?"

"It is a necessity," Ororo replied serenely, not even winded despite their sparring. "While I can't say for sure whether or not it is the same in your world, here, there are many ways to block powers, no matter their origin. For some, negating powers _is_ their power. So we all must learn to fight with or without them, in case we encounter a situation in which we cannot rely on them."

"True enough, I guess," Karina admitted a bit grudgingly after a minute.

"To be more relevant to your situation, there are times in which your powers are actually more of an inconvenience than they are an aid. An up-close hostage situation, for example."

That was true, too. Didn't make the ache in her back any less annoying, though. Especially not when the world spun after she was thrown again. "Ugh," she muttered as the older woman helped her to her feet.

"You will get it. Just keep practicing after you get home."

"Yes, ma'am," she said, glancing over with dread as Wanda approached. "Please tell me you're not here to help her toss me into walls," she begged, and both women laughed.

"No, this is just for a quick power lesson," Wanda replied, and with a wave of her hand, she made chairs of red energy materialize for all three of them. "Namely, in using your abilities as an extension of yourself, rather than apart from yourself. I think you'll find it enlightening."

Well. This was different. Curious, Karina sank into a chair and leaned her chin on her hands to listen.

 

"Hey, Karina, you in the middle of something?" Greer asked, leaning through the doorway, and Karina looked up from her absentminded doodling.

"Not really, what's up?"

"Pym called. He says there's some kind of problem at the tower lab, and we gotta go help contain it."

Karina had a sinking feeling, and quickly put on her fight suit. What if something had gone wrong with her doorway? What if it had exploded? Or some huge monster had come out of it? Or an invading army? It could all happen here, after all, and-

Her worried thoughts plagued her as they entered the tower, and she was so busy fretting that she didn't even notice that the place was eerily quiet for the middle of the day. Usually Tony's employees and scientists were bustling about in organized chaos, but the place seemed mostly empty except for Pepper, who guided them to the laboratory elevators.

"Did- did he say what kind of problem it was?" Karina asked as they rode down, and before Greer could answer, the doors opened and a sudden _explosion_ of sparkly confetti erupted through them. "Wha-"

Grinning broadly, Greer pushed her into the crowd of heroes and streamers, and she could see a huge "Happy Homecoming!" banner stretched over her doorway.

"You like it?" Janet asked, popping up behind her for a hug.

"I- I thought it wasn't supposed to be finished for two more days," Karina finally squeaked.

"Reed had an early epiphany," Pym said with a grin, indicating an older man in a blue uniform. "We finished ahead of schedule."

Karina bit her lip as she looked around, slowly processing the decorations, the food, and the smiles of everyone around her.

A party.

They were actually throwing her a _going away party._

"You _guys_ ," she mumbled, burying her face into Janet's neck so they wouldn't see her fighting not to cry. Thankfully, before any tears could escape, she was whisked into a flood of good-byes and well-wishes and last advice.

 

When she finally stood in front of the door again, the tone of the room had become more somber, but no less encouraging. "This will track your time and progress, letting you know how much further you have to go and how long you have to get there," Pym said, carefully fastening a small watch-like device around her wrist over her call bracelet.

"We'll be monitoring you the whole way," T'challa promised. "If anything goes wrong, Iron Man will come retrieve you."

"Here," Janet said, handing her a tiny package. "It's your old costume and all the work you did. Just press the little button to expand it back, or switch between the outfits if you're wearing one." Karina nodded and tucked it into her suit, then pulled out her communicator.

"I suppose I should give this back," she said, holding it out, but Steve gently closed her hand around it.

"Keep it. Besides being an interesting souvenir, it's yours."

"Once an Avenger, always an Avenger," Peter agreed, and Karina again had to force back the tears that threatened to well up.

"How am I gonna know which way to go?" she asked instead, and Pym grinned.

"That's easy." The gateway opened, and she could see stars and nebulae beyond it, along with- "Just follow the yellow brick road."

Judging by the snickers that rippled through the crowd and Peter's poorly hidden cough of "Dorks," Karina had a feeling the quite literal yellow brick road in front of her was supposed to be a reference of some kind, but she didn't ask, instead leaning into Janet and Greer when both girls hugged her again.

"Be careful," Greer said.

"Be safe," Janet said almost at the same time, then she smiled. "Go kick ass."

"Thanks, everybody," Karina said, wiping her eyes as they let her go. "For everything."

Then she held her breath and jumped.

 

Even with her powers, Karina was grateful for her suit. The void was colder than _anything_ she'd ever created. But the road under her was solid and wide enough that she had no fear of falling, so when the device on her arm beeped, she took off running.

The cold dragged at her legs and made her lungs burn, but she ignored it. Around her, comets shot back and forth and the stars and planets moved in ways they shouldn't have been, but she ignored them. There were strange whispers, inviting her away from her path to other worlds, but they weren't important. All that mattered was the road in front of her, the timer on her wrist, and the fact that she had an entire crowd of heroes behind her, watching her back.

As the timer and the road ran out, a white light suddenly appeared in front of her. Gritting her teeth and hoping for the best, she leaped for it.

The light closed around her, warm and comforting, and she could swear she heard cheering.

 

The light became star-studded darkness, and it took a minute for Karina to adjust enough to see that the ground under her feet was a rooftop, not the yellow road. She could now also see spotlights, and building spires, and when she leaned over the edge of the roof, she could see one of Hero TV's camera crews filming a fight as well.

Sternbild.

 _Home._

 _She'd made it._

She made a giddy noise before flinging herself off the building and calling up an ice slide to join in the fight. Dragon Kid made a startled noise as she dropped past with a wave, and Karina didn't even slow down, launching a ball of ice at a criminal about to get the upper hand on Tiger. "Hey, sweethearts! Miss me?" she called to both sides of the battle, and whipped several icicles in the direction of the robbers with guns. Two missed, still managing to pin the men's sleeves against a building so they couldn't fire, but three hit their targets, embedding themselves into the barrels of the firearms. _'Too bad Hawkeye couldn't see that.'_

 _"Rose! You're okay!"_

"Better than okay," she said, flashing a grin in Sky High's direction. "Check me out, I'm _upgraded_!" She barely heard Mario announcing her return or her capture points, just basking in being back and missed-

 

-Until they arrived back at HQ and she found Robert waiting for her. He gave her a friendly "Glad you're home" and a smile, but everything about his stance screamed 'defense', and that could only mean one thing.

She had to go see the bosses.

Karina waved the others off with a smile, promising she'd catch up in a bit, then straightened her back and went with her lawyer. She'd known she was going to have to do this eventually once she got back, and better to get it over with now, right? She'd just explain what happened... or explain as best as she could, and show off how useful and cool-looking her costume was, and-

 

-get shot down like a Skrull battleship.

She had to resist the urge to punch the nearest door as she left the meeting room, and brushed off Robert's concerned questions. She was fine. She was _peachy_.

She'd just made all that progress for _nothing_ , that was all.

It didn't matter how cool her suit was or how cool her new fighting style was. It wasn't the kind of cool they wanted. It wasn't the _image_ they wanted.

And here she was, back to image again.

She bit her tongue to make herself get back under control, then plastered on a smile and used the little device Janet had given her to switch uniforms before heading down to the locker rooms, where everyone else had already finished changing.

"Honey, where's the new look?" Nathan asked as soon as she walked in the door, and Karina tried to make her smile a little more genuine. It didn't exactly work.

"Bosses said I had to go back to the old one," she said with a shrug, sitting down to strip off the heeled boots.

"Pity," he murmured. "It really did work well for you."

"You looked great," Pao-lin agreed.

"Yeah, well, I'll just keep it for costume parties or something," she said, feigning nonchalance.

Something else was nagging at her now, and she knew immediately what it was. None of them were touching her. If she'd been with Greer or Janet, they would have immediately resorted to hugs, and even the others would have had a consoling pat on the shoulder ready. She went around the lockers to finish changing, but watched them in one of the mirrors as she did so. Nathan was Nathan, of course, and Keith was his cheerful self as usual, but the professional distance was still _there_ between them all, and it kind of stung to actually be able to see it from a different perspective.

She already missed being part of the family.

Well, there was no use in moping about it. She finished getting dressed and pulled on her cap, then went out to join them, and jumped with a small squeak when a hand rumpled cap and ruffled hair as soon as she came out. Straightening the cap so she could see, she glared up at Kotetsu.

"Hope they at least let you keep the moves," he said encouragingly. "Where'd you pick that style up?"

"Tell you later." She'd been eager to share the story before, but after what had happened in the meeting, she really just wanted to go home.

"You know, you probably saved my hide with that knife trick."

Karina blinked up at him, and barely managed to catch herself before she could lean into his hand. "Really?"

"Yep. Not bulletproof when the time runs out, remember? Anyway, you mind if we treat you to lunch tomorrow? Call it a coming home present."

The offer made her feel mildly less off-balance, and she smiled. "Sure."

 

When she finally sank onto her own bed at home, stuffed from the impromptu celebration dinner her parents had put together for her return, she pulled her communicator and the little storage device out of her pockets. Without her costume on, pressing the button merely discharged her new suit and the notes she'd taken from the other world.

Sitting up cross-legged, she laid everything out in front of her with a scowl. It wasn't _fair._ Kotetsu could get away with his beliefs because no one really gave a damn what he did. She didn't have that freedom. She'd come into this whole business to save lives, hadn't she? And yet-

 _"It's true,"_ Steve's voice echoed in her mind. _"Captain America was a creation of the US Army's propaganda division. With only a few surviving subjects of the super-soldier treatment, they just couldn't think of a viable combat option. So the others barely even got the chance to start out before being sent home, and I was mostly just a show piece."_

 _"What changed?"_

 _"There were civilians being pinned down by gunfire in a town we passed through. I couldn't just let them be wiped out, so I ignored orders and went in myself."_ He'd given her a wry grin at that. _"Sometimes, being able to look yourself in the mirror is more important than what you're being told-"_

 _"-Especially when your orders are bull,"_ Logan's voice cut in, from another conversation she'd had. _"I'm not proud of the things I'd been told to do back when I didn't have the ability to say no. So I'm trying to do better now-"_  
 _  
"-Doing good where I can,"_ Janet had said as she was curled up with her sketchbook. _"Don't get me wrong, I like punching bad guys, but mostly I just wanted to be able to help people. The press and everything used to give me a lot of stupid crap for going on humanitarian missions and such. Going masked for awhile... gave me legitimacy, I guess. They've seen me put myself on the front lines too many times to question me now-"_

 _"-But I still question myself,"_ Wanda had murmured, swirling her tea in its cup. _"I suppose it's only inevitable to do so, considering my past. But that's why heroing is so important to me. I want to show to others who might end up in the position I was in that in order to be a hero, you have to be willing to protect all people hurt and oppressed, not just the ones who are like you."_

 _"Because with great power comes great responsibility."_ Peter had looked away from her then, fidgeting uncomfortably before he'd finally looked down at his hands. _"Someone important to me used to say that a lot. And I lost that someone because I forgot it. Someone who-"_

 _"-Saved my life, really,"_ Tony had said as he was crouched over a piece of the armor, fishing shrapnel out of a joint. _"And he drove home a good point. There are always people who are going to use tech to beat others down. I guess I'm just trying to find some sort of balance by using it to protect people-"_

 _"-Because power is only as good as what it is used for,"_ Ororo had replied to her question, pushing a tiny raincloud over the plants in the rooftop greenhouse. _"No matter what their strength or ability, everyone eventually has the choice to help, harm, or do nothing at all."_

Karina blew out a breath and rested her head on her knees. It was all good advice, but it still didn't help her situation. The show-

 _"Ugh, no. They just get in the way,"_ Janet's voice said again from the first day they'd met, and slowly, a smile spread across Karina's face as it gave her an idea.

"No one said I couldn't wear the suit if I wasn't being filmed," she murmured, reaching over to grab it. "An Avenger would still go out and fight, even without cameras on her."

 _'And I'm still an Avenger.'_

 _~Fin_

**Author's Note:**

> There's a lot I made up whole-cloth (for instance, Silverclaw and MI-13 never had Marvel Adventures counterparts), but well, continuity reboot. I think the fact that the powers that be decided to abandon the sandbox that was _Marvel Adventures Avengers_ gives me a little more leeway to play in it as I damn well please. Hope you enjoyed the results!


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